本論文透過兩項研究，探討家長與幼兒在家進行數字棋盤遊戲時，應如何與幼兒互動，以培養幼兒的數字感及學習數學的興趣。 / 研究1旨在檢視香港幼兒數字感的發展趨勢，以及不同級別幼兒參與數字棋盤遊戲的能力。此外，研究1會考察家長與幼兒進行數字棋盤遊戲時的表現，並探究其與幼兒數字感及學習數學的興趣的關連。因此，研究1收集51名香港三至六歲幼兒在八項數字感測試的得分，以及其學習數學的興趣水平，並邀請這些幼兒與其家長進行一個數字棋盤遊戲。研究結果發現，在不少數字感測試項目中，各級別幼兒之間都存有顯著的差異。一般而言，低班幼兒已具備參與數字棋盤遊戲的能力。當家長與幼兒進行數字棋盤遊戲，並輪至他們移動棋子時，他們很少邀請幼兒參與其中。雖然「辨讀棋子移動後所停留方格中的數字」、「辨讀棋子移動時所經方格中的數字」及「辨識棋子移動後所停留方格中的數字與其他數字的關連」三項行為在家長與幼兒互動時甚少出現，但有關行為的出現程度與幼兒部份數字感元素有著正向的關連。 / 研究2旨在了解當家長接受親子活動策略訓練後，家長定期與幼兒進行數字棋盤遊戲，能否培養幼兒的數字感及學習數學的興趣。因此，研究2以實驗形式，邀請四組共91位家長與其低班幼兒在家進行不同的親子活動 (經訓練的遊戲組、遊戲組、紙筆練習組，以及控制組)，然後比較各組幼兒在前後測的表現。研究結果發現，對數學能力非特別優異的幼兒而言，數字棋盤遊戲與紙筆練習兩者均能提升幼兒數字序列背誦及兩位數字認讀的能力。當家長接受訓練後，家長定期與幼兒進行數字棋盤遊戲，更能提升幼兒加法運算的能力。不論家長接受訓練與否，定期與幼兒進行數字棋盤遊戲能培養幼兒學習數學的興趣。 / 歸納以上研究結果，本論文顯示家長可透過與幼兒在家進行有關數字的活動，培養幼兒的數字感及學習數學的興趣。然而，不少家長與幼兒進行有關活動時，往往未有充分把握教學機會。因此，家長有需要接受有關方面的訓練。 / Through two related studies, this dissertation investigated how parents should interact with their preschool children during home numeracy activities, such as number board game playing, so as to promote children’s number sense and interest in mathematics. / In Study 1, I examined Hong Kong preschool children’s number sense development and their competence in playing number board game. Furthermore, I investigated whether parents had utilized number board game playing experiences to foster their preschool children’s number sense and interest in mathematics. The relations of the prevalence of various numeracy-related events during number board game playing to children’s number sense and interest in mathematics were also explored. Fifty-one Hong Kong three- to six-year-old preschool children were first tested on eight number sense tasks (including object counting, rote counting, missing number, numeral identification, numeral writing, numerical magnitude comparison, addition, and subtraction). Their interest in mathematics was also measured. Then, parents of these children were asked to play a number board game with their children in dyads. The parent-child interactions during the game were coded and analyzed. Results showed that third year kindergarteners (K3) performed better than second year kindergarteners (K2) on all number sense tasks except object counting and rote counting. K2 children performed better than first year kindergarteners (K1) on all number sense tasks except addition and subtraction. Usually, by K2, children could start to play number board games. When parents played number board game with their preschool children, they seldom elicited children’s participation during their turns to move the token. The events “announcing the final number“, “announcing the numbers passed through“, and “stating the numerical relations of the final number to other numbers only rarely occurred, though the prevalence of these events was positively associated with some components of children’s number sense (e.g., numeral identification, numeral writing, addition, and subtraction). / In Study 2, I investigated the extent to which offering a training program to parents on strategies of interacting with preschool children during number board game playing, together with regular playing of number board games with children, could promote children’s number sense and interest in mathematics. Ninety-one K2 children and their parents were recruited as participants; and an experimental design that involved the pre-test-post-test comparisons of four conditions (i.e., the game with a training condition, the game condition, the exercise condition, and the control condition) was used. Results showed that among children who were not very skilled in mathematics, number board game playing shared some similar educational benefits with completing mathematics exercises from books, such as promoting children’s rote counting and two-digit numeral writing skills. When parents received training, number board game playing could even promote children’s addition skills. No matter whether parents received training, number board game playing could promote children’s interest in mathematics. / Findings of these two studies suggest that home numeracy activities, such as number board game playing, can promote preschool children’s number sense and interest in mathematics. Nevertheless, parents may not be aware of the opportunities to incorporate numeracy into these activities. Therefore, training of parents is needed. / Detailed summary in vernacular field only. / Detailed summary in vernacular field only. / Detailed summary in vernacular field only. / Detailed summary in vernacular field only. / Cheung, Sum Kwing. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2012. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 195-211). / Electronic reproduction. Hong Kong : Chinese University of Hong Kong, [2012] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Abstract also in Chinese. / Acknowledgements --- p.iii / List of Tables --- p.vi / Abstract --- p.x / Chapter Chapter One --- Introduction --- p.1 / Chapter Chapter Two --- Study 1 --- p.47 / Method --- p.51 / Results --- p.62 / Discussion --- p.105 / Chapter Chapter Three --- Study 2 --- p.120 / Method --- p.127 / Results --- p.141 / Discussion --- p.173 / Chapter Chapter Four --- General Discussion --- p.184 / References --- p.195 / Appendix --- p.212

In my dissertation, I study the short- and long-term effects of early-life circumstances on individual’s human capital and explore some potential mechanisms driving these impacts. The focus on early-life conditions is motivated by the growing body of research showing the important role that early-life conditions play in shaping adult outcomes (Barker, 1992; Cunha and Heckman, 2007; Almond and Currie, 2011a). Evidence from natural experiments has found that adverse conditions during the in-utero and childhood periods (e.g., disease outbreaks, famines and malnutrition, weather shocks, ionizing radiation, earthquakes, air pollution) can have negative effects on health, education, and labor market outcomes (e.g., Almond, 2006; Almond et al., 2010; Van den Berg et al., 2006; Currie and Rossin-Slater, 2013; Almond, Edlund and Palme, 2009; Sanders, 2012). I focus on a particular shock which is violence – i.e., wars, armed conflicts, urban crime – that represents one of the most pervasive shocks for individual’s well-being and which mostly affects developing countries (Currie and Vogl, 2013). The World Bank (2013) estimates that more than 1.5 billion people in the developing world live in chronically violent contexts. Violence creates poverty, accentuates inequality, destroys infrastructure, displaces populations, disrupts schooling, and affects health. While recent research has shown the large damage on education and health outcomes from early life violence (Camacho, 2008; Akresh, Lucchetti and Thirumurthy, 2012; Minoiu and Shemyakina, 2012; Brown, 2014; Valente, 2011; Leon, 2012), several key questions remain unaddressed. First, how does violence affect other domains of human capital beside education and health (i.e., cognitive and non-cognitive skills)? Identifying such effects is important both because measures of human capital (physical, cognitive, and non-cognitive indicators) can explain a large percentage of the variation in later-life educational attainment and wages (Currie and Thomas, 1999; McLeod and Kaiser, 2004; Heckman, Stixrud and Urzua, 2006) and to understand mechanisms behind previous effects found for educational attainment and health. Second, to what extent do the effects of violence at different developmental stages (i.e., in-utero vs. in childhood) differ? Do the effects of violence persist in the long-term? Do impacts on the particular type of skill considered (e.g., health vs. cognitive outcomes) differ by the developmental timing of the shock? Third, given the size and persistence of the effects of violence, it is also natural to ask whether and how parental investments also may respond to these shocks. Family investments are important determinants of human capital (Cunha and Heckman, 2007; Aizer and Cunha, 2014) and parental responses can play a key role in compensating or reinforcing the effects of a shock (Almond and Currie, 2011a). At present, well-identified empirical evidence on this question is scarce. Finally, and perhaps most importantly from a policy perspective, is there potential for remediation?: Can social programs that are available to the community help mitigate the negative effects of violence on vulnerable children? My identification strategy exploits the temporal and geographic variation in local violence conditions. In particular, I exploit the occurrence of specific violent events such as homicides and massacres at the monthly-year-municipality levels in Colombia and I use large and varied micro data sets to provide causal estimates. I believe that the results from my research can shed some light on the consequences of early-life exposure to violence on human capital, some of the potential mechanisms through which these impacts operate, and provide some insights on possible public policy implications. In the first essay, “Early-life Conditions, Parental Investments, and Child Development: Evidence from a Violent Country,” I investigate how exposure to community violence during the in utero and childhood periods affect a child’s physical, cognitive, and socio-emotional development; how violence affects parental investments such as parenting quality; and whether social policies available to the community help mitigate the negative effects of violence on children. I focus on children, which is a particularly vulnerable subpopulation: Children in developing countries are subject to more and more frequent adverse conditions, start disadvantaged, and receive lower levels of investments compared with children from wealthier environments (Currie and Vogl, 2013). I show that children exposed to massacres in their municipality during their in utero and in childhood periods achieve lower health, cognitive, and socio-emotional outcomes and that the timing in which these exposures occur matters. In particular, exposure to massacres in late pregnancy and in childhood reduce child’s health and exposures in early pregnancy and in childhood lower cognitive test scores. Adequate interaction, an indicator of child socio-emotional development, falls among children who were exposed to violence after birth. Moreover, results show that violence is negatively associated with birth weight, an important input in the production of human capital. This impact is driven by exposure during the first trimester of pregnancy. Furthermore, I find that changes in violence during a child’s childhood are associated with lower quantity and quality of parenting. In particular, I find that an increase in violence is associated with a decline in the time mothers spend with their child, a decrease in the frequency of routines that stimulate a child’s cognitive development, and an increase in psychological aggression, which could reflect a mother’s stress. Overall, these results show little evidence that parents compensate the negative effect of violence on child outcomes. This is the first study to investigate the effects of early-life violence on child cognitive and non-cognitive outcomes in a developing country and among the first to investigate the role of parenting as a potential channel of transmission. Lastly, I find weak evidence that social programs have remediating impacts on children affected by violence. In the second essay, titled “The Hidden Costs and Lasting Legacies of Violence on Education: Evidence from Colombia”, I provide evidence of the long term impacts of exposure to crime and violence, from the prenatal period to age five, on an individual’s educational attainment. My identification strategy exploits the temporal and geographic variation in cohorts of individuals exposed to homicide rates during in their early lives during the 1980s and 1990s in Colombia, a period with an unprecendented rise in criminal activity. I use Census data that provide detailed information on the date and municipality of birth, and long-run outcomes (i.e., education) for each individual, which enables me to identify the violence to which a person was exposed in utero and in early childhood (as well as in later stages). I find that high violence in early-life is associated with lower educational attainment in the future (years of schooling and lower school enrollment). The findings also show that in utero and early-childhood exposure to violence has a more pronounced impact on human capital attainment than exposure at other stages of the life course (i.e., school age, adolescence). The timing and the magnitude of the effects are important considering the huge inequality in education in developing countries.

Using the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health), this dissertation explores whether fathers talking to their children about dating affects the odds of their children having unprotected sex when they are emerging adults. Logistic regressions were used to analyze the relationship between one measure of father engagement, talking to the child about dating, and sexual risk taking, operationalized as having unprotected sex. Utilizing social capital theory and Lamb, Pleck, Charnov and Levine’s (1985, 1987) conceptualization of fatherhood, this paper explored the possibility that father involvement could either increase or decrease child’s sexual risk. Results from the first model indicate that talking to the father about dating increases the odds of children having unprotected sex. The results also showed that feeling close to the father was not a moderator. The second model investigated if there is a difference in the effect of father involvement by gender. Talking to the father about dating increased the odds of nonresident daughters and resident sons having unprotected sex. Feeling close to the father was not a moderator. The third model explored if there was a difference in the effects of father involvement by race and did find a difference. White resident children had increased odds of having unprotected sex if they talked to their fathers about dating. Feeling close to the father was not a moderator in this chapter. These results challenge the prominent narrative in the literature that father involvement is an unmitigated good influence in the child’s life; instead, these results show that for some children father involvement can create more harm than good. It is important to note that most fathers did not talk to their children about dating and that the specific content and tone of the conversations these fathers had with their children is unknown. There is space in the literature to explore how specific messages fathers give their children influence their sexual risk decisions in the future. There is also space for the creation of feminist focused fatherhood programs to help fathers talk to their children about dating and sex in a way that reduces child risk taking when they are older.

Transition from high school to adulthood for students with developmental disabilities is a monumental stage for both the individual and his or her family. Past research has shown that one of the most salient predictors of students’ successful transition is their parents’ involvement with transition planning, however, during this time parent involvement often declines (Grigal & Neubert, 2004). The current study examined parent involvement and knowledge during the transition from high school to adulthood for the parents of young adults with developmental disabilities. Participants included a diverse sample of 55 parents in an urban school district who had youth with special needs between the ages of 14 and 22. The present study examined parental psychosocial factors, demographic factors, parents’ experiences during the transition process, and three dimensions of their educational involvement: school involvement, transition involvement, and transition knowledge. The study found that parent experiences during the transition period (IEP familiarity, perceived teacher invitations, and perceived time and energy) as well as the socio-economics of school neighborhood, were the most salient factors associated with parental involvement and knowledge. The study offers suggestions for future research, policy, and intervention ideas to assist in improving parents’ positive experiences during the transition process. These suggestions aim in increasing parental involvement and knowledge during an important time in their youths’ educational development.

Math storybook reading can be a beneficial activity in the home numeracy environment that facilitates children’s exploration and understanding of numbers. Parents play an important role in guiding and supporting their children’s math development through their joint engagement in the story. Exploring how parents and their children interact during home activities such as math storybook reading is crucial given strong associations between the home numeracy environment and later academic success. The primary goal of this study was to investigate how parents supported their children’s early numeracy development as they responded to children’s number mistakes and engaged their children in conversation about the number concepts present in the story. Observations of parent-child interactions (n = 47) while reading a math storybook and interviews with parents were intended to uncover how parents can use storybooks as a means of involving their children in math learning and guiding their understanding of numbers. The present study expands on the extant math storybook literature by examining the role of parental beliefs and home practices in shaping parents’ and children’s behaviors during math storybook reading. Results indicated that parents’ beliefs about the importance of early math learning and their role in helping their children learn math were associated with a lower frequency of children’s simple math mistakes, a greater degree of support parents provided in response to those mistakes, and a greater amount of simple math concepts parents discussed with their children while reading. Furthermore, children exposed to a greater frequency of home counting activities completed more of the math tasks in the storybook. Finally, three main factors that appeared to drive parents’ selection and use of math storybooks were children’s interest, attention spans, and math abilities. These findings support the use of math storybooks as a potentially beneficial activity that can elicit positive parent-child interactions around number concepts and demonstrate that parents are intentional in how they use storybooks to guide their children’s math development. The results are discussed in relation to home support for early numerical development and contextualized within the math storybook literature.

Parents have been shown to be a crucial driver in a child's educational outcomes in both the economics and education literature. However, researchers have yet to understand the roles that educational interventions, information, and policies might have on parental behavior and engagement toward their child's education and, in turn, how to effectively promote parental engagement for the benefits of children. In my dissertation, I examine how educational interventions and policies can impact the behavior and decision-making of parents and in turn affect student achievement. Specifically, I add to the scholarly literature evidence on (a) how being identified as gifted student affect parental levels of engagement and time investments, (b) how timely information about academic progress might change parental behaviors and improve educational outcomes, and (c) how immigrant mothers react to an expansion of pre-K specifically targeted at their children. Chapter one examines the short-term and long-term effects of an elementary school gifted education program in California that clusters 6-8 gifted students in classrooms. While I examine the academic effects of the program, I emphasize the analysis on the role of parent engagement and time investments in the lives of gifted children. While the gifted education literature has studied the causal effects of programs, there is limited evidence on how parent engagement might change as a result of these programs and its potential as a mechanism for achievement effects. Therefore, this study contributes to the economic debate of whether parent engagement is a complement or substitute to education quality. Using a fuzzy regression discontinuity approach, I primarily find small to no evidence on short-term academic effects, but stronger effects on longer-term course-taking and college outcomes. On the parent side, I find that while most parents are not more engaged overall, parents of minority gifted children and low-socioeconomic students are. The implication is that there is heterogeneity in the manner by which parents react behaviorally to students that are identified as gifted. In Chapter two, a joint paper with Peter Bergman, we run a randomized controlled trial in West Virginia examining the effects of a high-frequency academic information intervention on middle and high school student' academic outcomes. In this field experiment, we send out three types of alerts to parents - weekly missing assignments, weekly class absences, and monthly low grade average - during the 2015-16 school year. We find that the intervention reduces course failures by 38%, increases class attendance by 17%, and increases retention. We find no evidence that test scores improve, but find that there are significant improvements on in-class exam scores. The evidence of improvement in test scores show that there are information frictions between parent and child, and thus parents may have inaccurate beliefs about their child's abilities due to a lack of complete information. Chapter three examines the maternal labor supply and pre-K enrollment effects of a bilingual pre-K policy implemented in Illinois during the 2010-11 school year, which came after the implementation of a statewide universal pre-K program in 2007. Research has shown the importance of quality preschool in the development of a child, with minorities particularly sensitive to the prevalence of quality early childhood education. In this study, I exploit variation in a policy mandating that any school with at least twenty identified English Language Learner student of a particular language is required to open up a bilingual classroom for those students. Using multiple control groups and various difference-in-differences specifications, I find that there is little to no change in maternal labor supply among Hispanics and recent immigrants, including the probability of being in the labor force, hours worked per week, and wage and salary income. However, I also find a significant and robust increase of 18-20 percentage points in the enrollment of 3- and 4-year old children into pre-K programs in Illinois. This result shows that, even in a state where there is universal access to pre-K, the design of such policies might not have sufficient reach to high-need parents. Taken together, this dissertation helps deepen our understanding of the various roles parents might affect educational outcomes and inequality. As my results demonstrate, there are various ways which help and incentivize parents to react in a manner that will improve childhood and long-term outcomes. Whether by programs, information, or public policy, the tools are many, yet it is crucial that scholarly work continues to dive deeper into how parents, children, and other stakeholders react.

The purpose of the current study is to examine emotional and behavioral interdependence within the triadic family system. Interdependence was assessed over time between 17 participant groups of mothers, fathers and preschoolers. Responses of each parent and preschooler were observed during story recitations that were chosen to elicit positive or negative responses; observations included measures of attention, external affect, and affective congruency. Parental self-report ratings of expressivity, negative emotions, and child temperament were compared to observations during story recitations, as well. Some father-child interactions appeared to be affected by story condition. However, parent gender had little effect on parent-child interactions overall in regards to child consistency. The findings suggest that children drive the interactions more so than parents. Further research with a larger sample size is needed to fully examine the emotional and behavioral interdependence between parents and preschoolers. / Includes bibliography. / Thesis (M.A.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2017. / FAU Electronic Theses and Dissertations Collection

Involving parents in school-based learning can be difficult for both schools and parents, and more innovative approaches to involving parents are needed. Internet-based programs have the potential to address barriers to parent participation, but more research is needed to determine the effectiveness and social validity of such programs. This study explored the social validity of WhyTry for Parents, an internet-based program for parents of students enrolled in WhyTry, a school-based social and emotional learning program for students in grades K through 12. Eleven elementary, middle, and high schools across the United States participated in the study by inviting parents of WhyTry students to use the WhyTry for Parents curriculum. Whether or not parents utilized the curriculum, they were invited to take a survey about the importance they placed on the program's goals, procedures, and effects, and to give reasons for their level of participation in the program. A total of 836 parents were invited to take part in the study, and 14 parents made up the final sample. Coordinators (n = 10) of the WhyTry program at each school were invited to participate in interviews focused on their perspectives of parent participation rates and the WhyTry for Parents program. Regardless of whether parents utilized the curriculum, they found a high degree of social validity in WhyTry for Parents; however, they suggested that the curriculum be simplified and made more accessible. WhyTry coordinators suggested that low participation rates were due to parent resistance, and that helping parents to understand WhyTry might help overcome this resistance. Parents and coordinators suggested that the curriculum be available by app to improve accessibility. Future research should explore the social validity of WhyTry for Parents from the perspective of educators, who implement the program at the school level. Studying the costs associated with internet-based parent programs for both schools and parents may also be prudent.

Thesis (M. Dev.) --University of Limpopo, 2005 / Refer to document

Latinos are the largest and fastest growing ethnic minority group in the United States. Academically, they are significantly trailing their non-Latino peers in graduation and overall educational attainment. Among many socioeconomic factors, parent engagement has been identified as being a defining indicator of student success. Reflective of racial and class disparities, this study explored with the use of critical race and intersectionality theory, that low Latino parent engagement is a result of the historical devaluing and omission of Latino culture, history and language from formal academic settings, and compounding social factors that make engagement complex for Latino immigrants in America today. In search of programmatic designs that better engage Latino families, this study explored a culturally specific program in San Francisco and its impact on engaging Latino immigrant parents. Using ethnographic methodologies, this study found via direct observation, a parent focus group, nine parent interviews and seven school personnel interviews that culturally specific programs can successful build relationships, create inclusive spaces, counter ideas of deficit thinking, interrupt systems of oppression, and strengthen community engagement. Implications of this study on social work education, practice, and policy will be discussed.